Aspie docs

[Guest guest]

I am Aspie, and do indeed do bedside patient care (18 years in

practice), and have trained Aspie students who are in practice,

successfully so. I also work with at least one Aspie doctor. If you

listen to Tony Attwood's radio show on Asperger's Women's radio, he

says that one of the differences in female Aspies is their need to be

caregivers, and that many Aspie women are drawn to the medical field.

I think there may be more women Aspie docs than is currently

recognized (two of the eight faculty in my department at the school

is clearly Aspie). I have also known some male docs who are Aspie,

and are quite successful at bedside patient care.

I think it safe to say I do not have the skills or temperament to be

an administrator. I couldn't stand it and would not be any good at

it. I am sure that many Aspies do not enjoy or cannot do bedside

care, but that is where I thrive. And as an osteopathic physician who

also does osteopathic manipulative medicine, I am not only doing

clinical care, but care that is high contact, high touch. I feel

starved if I am not doing hands on care.

>

> I don't think that you see that many doctors who are severe aspies.

> The lack of empathy and the self-centeredness would prevent them

> from wanting to enter a field where you CARE for people. On the

> other hand, the first 2 years of medical school would be easy to get

> thru, and then it wouldn't , in my opion, be that hard to slip thru

> your next two years being a " good goffer " and really not be found

> incompetent. It would be when you really need to be a caring one on

> one doctor, that the repeated failure of communication and empathy

> would stand out.

>

> I don't train doctors, but I am one, and although I agree there are

> some " strange ducks " in medicine, I don't know that I have met any

> aspies doing bedside patient care. Maybe in administration, but....

>

> Pat

>